Staten Island Technical High School’s “Team TechSmart” gets 10K from M.I.T. to design/create a “Comfort Control Wheelchair”
Written by admin2 on October 26th, 2009Filed under: Themes, Wheelchairman of the Board
Quoting Diane Lore, writing on SILive.com:
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Staten Island Technical High School is gaining national recognition for its proposal to help design a state-of-the-art wheelchair to assist the physically challenged. The New Dorp school was recently awarded a $10,000 grant from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to research, design and develop a new type of wheelchair. Tech is one of 15 high schools nationwide selected to participate in MIT’s InvenTeam initiative. InvenTeams, comprised of high school students, teachers and mentors, receive grants up to $10,000 to invent technological solutions to real-world problems. The MIT initiative, in its seventh year, aims to inspire a new generation of inventors. Tech engineering teacher Steven J. Raile applied for the MIT grant last spring and attended training at MIT in June to mentor his students in the process. Their wheelchair will be designed with a bacteria-free seat, which will allow the user to relieve pressure, as well as control the temperature. “The idea is to keep the user comfortable while minimizing the likelihood of him or her developing sores from sitting immobile,” Raile explained.
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